The present invention relates generally to telecommunications services. More particularly, the present application relates to a method and system for providing enhanced caller identification information even to subscribers who interface the telecommunication network via private trunk group facilities.
Telecommunications service providers typically offer services that attempt to provide customers with information that enables them to determine whether or not to accept a call before answering the call. One service that provides such information is caller identification (“Caller ID”). Standard Caller ID services generally provide a customer with an indication of who is calling without requiring the customer to answer the call. These systems typically retrieve information about the calling party from a database and provide that information to the called party. Customer premise equipment (CPE) in the form of a display device is generally used to provide the called party with a visual readout of the name and/or telephone number associated with the calling party.
However, the effectiveness of Caller ID systems can be reduced due to a number of different occurrences. One such occurrence is the inability of a service provider to provide the standard Caller ID information for a particular incoming call. A service provider may not be able to provide the standard Caller ID information if the Caller ID information is blocked by the calling party, or if the Caller ID information is unavailable or incomplete. This may occur, for example, if the calling party pressed *67 when initiating the call
When the standard Caller ID information cannot be provided, the called party is not adequately informed about who is calling and cannot determine whether or not to accept the incoming call before answering the call. Because the effectiveness of Caller ID systems is greatly reduced when information cannot be provided, an improved system and method for providing caller identification information that overcome these deficiencies are needed.
Patent application Ser. No. 09/122,484, filed Jul. 24, 1998, issued Jan. 23, 2001 as U.S. Pat. No. 6,178,232 and commonly assigned to the assignee of the present application, is incorporated herein by reference. This patent application discloses a method and system for providing a called party with audible caller identification information when standard caller identification cannot be provided. When standard caller identification cannot be provided, the call is blocked and a request for audible caller identification is transmitted to the calling party. The audible information is subsequently transmitted to the called party.
Patent application Ser. No. 09/253,339, filed Feb. 19, 1999 and issued Dec. 12, 2000 as U.S. Pat. No. 6,160,876, is also incorporated herein by reference. This application discloses a method for providing enhanced caller identification information when per line blocking of Caller ID is present. When per line blocking is activated for a subscriber line, the Caller ID information for that line is never transmitted by the system.
In the systems disclosed in the incorporated patent applications, subscribers that interface with network equipment via private Trunk Group facilities can not benefit from those systems. In some embodiments of those systems, network equipment such as a Service Switching Point (SSP) encounters a terminating attempt trigger when processing a call to a called communication station over a conventional subscriber loop. Encountering the terminating attempt trigger initiates the process of routing the call to a privacy service for obtaining audible caller identification information. However, in the case where the subscriber interfaces with the network over private Trunk Group facilities, the terminating attempt trigger is never encountered.
Examples of private Trunk Group facilities includes private branch exchanges (PBXs), which are used for example, to provide telecommunication service to a plurality of directory numbers, for example at a business. The result is that subscribers who access the telecommunication network over such private facilities can not enjoy the benefits of privacy service in which callers must provide either standard or audible caller identification information.
Accordingly, there is a need for a system and method which permit subscribers using private facilities to detect and suspend a call for which the standard calling party information can not be provided, before the call is communicated to the called party.